The spring of a year ago had brought with it such an energetic, vibrant, flourishing breath of life into her spirit, which had not known such a sensation for a time as long as she could have remembered during those frightening, but oddly exciting days. That verdant season was followed by the hazy, lethargic summer, which had tampered her new excitable, childish energies with a dampening, sweltering, quiet heat, fostering inside of herself a desire to live comfortably; not only by herself, but with those people closest to herself. After that, came the calm, but nourishing season of autumn, in which she finally had started to feel as if she was a thing that belonged not only to the world, but a thing that belongs to people, who in turn belong to herself.

The final season, of course, being winter, had painted over all of those new foundations and constructs of her soul, covering them in a quiet resolution to never, ever, ever let go of these new feelings, to never, ever, EVER let them be taken away by anyone or anything, especially by her own self, her old self, by her own bad habits and tendencies, by her previous deeply set desires to punish herself for even just existing.

Spring has now come again, a full cycle of seasons having been completed and the thing that is here now, the thing that she is, a person, imperfect, perhaps a bit unwell, mentally, but happy, this person is the final result of what has been the most fulfilling time she could have ever imagined happening. Despite everything, despite how it all looks right now, despite what has happened on the way and what will happen still, Fresh wouldn’t trade it for a single other possible existence in this world or any other.

Fresh can’t help but smile as she looks at the monstrous coagulation, made up out of languishing, melted faces, at the creature, the entity that does nothing but scream and lash, at the thousand eyes which look around themselves in a fury, the tendrils whipping and striking out around in all directions, destroying everything in their paths.

The water rises higher and higher, slowly starting to swallow the city, slowly rising up towards the castle, set up high atop the roots of the dead world-tree, where the last of the people likely are surviving, barring one or two people stuck on an attic, roof or wall.

“Hey!” Fresh cups her hand by her mouth, calling out to the entity, Perchta. “I want a raise,” she jokes. “This is too much work for one employIEEE~!” Fresh ducks out of the way, the broom shooting to the side to avoid the heap of toxic sludge thrown her way by a large tendril.

She thought it was a good joke. Shamrock would have liked it.

The broom comes to a stop, hovering off to the side as the entity makes its way towards the castle. Perchta, now outside of her usual, quiet, environment, apparently isn’t much of a talker.

Fresh shoots to the side as another tendril blasts out of the oozy water beneath herself, ducking and weaving as a mass of the winding, eye-dotted growths suddenly appear before herself. They silhouette her on all sides, as if she were flying through a forest, between the thick trunks of many trees that then try to collapse down on top of herself. Water splashes everywhere as they land back into the murk, the tide rising higher, the entity moving through the city, destroying anything that’s left on its way to the castle.

She flies out of Perchta’s reach.

Honestly, she herself doesn’t even seem to be the primary target here. Perchta seems to be focused on the people of the city first and foremost. After everything, it’s almost a little insulting, really.

The witch rises higher into the air, getting further out of the grasp of the creature.

A bright, orange glare catches her attention as something erupts from the east. Sparks shoot out in clear trails, breaking off in several directions. A firework, orange.

Fresh sighs in relief, holding a hand against her chest as she feels her heartbeat slow down again. Orange is the good signal. It looks like everyone made it safely outside after all. She was worried there for a while.

Relieved, the witch turns back towards the entity, still heading towards the castle. She really owes herself for this, big-time.

The question is, does she wait for Perchta to destroy the castle or not? On one hand, it’ll take care of the whole ‘witnesses’ thing, which is of course, critical for their future survival. But, on the other hand, it is kind of a grim thing to even be considering. Man, she really used to be a lot nicer than this, huh?

Fresh scratches her cheek with her left hand, pondering the morality of the situation, but then just shakes her head. What an odd train of thought. Of course, they need the people in the castle to survive, so it’s not really a question, just more of an idle consideration while she’s trying to pass the time. She needs to give the hero some leeway to make his way back, after all.

The horrible witch flies back down into the fray, pushing through the mass of tendrils, dotted with eyes that all turn to focus on her. “Hey, Perchta,” says Fresh. “How’s it going?” she asks. “I like your eyes! All… uh… well, all of them.”

The entity screams a wordless, agonized, guttural howl, its massive head, the size of several houses, turns to face her, its mouth twisted and broken, dropping and sloshing in on itself only for more ooze to reform the face a second later.

“I was afraid you’d say that…” says Fresh. A shadow looms over her head. She yelps, the nimble broom flying away as she shoots towards the castle, wanting to get there first.

Fresh lands at the gate to the entrance, several of the usual cloaked guardsman there. Fresh gives them a thumbs-up. “It’s great that you guys take your work so seriously,” she says, looking around. “Hey, is Muldrich around?”

“W- who?” asks a castle-guard nervously.

Fresh frowns. “Do you guys have contact with the city-guard, usually?”

A guardsman screams, dropping his pike and running away, his cape flowing behind him as he dashes towards the castle.

Fresh blinks. That was a confusing response. She shrugs, turning back towards the entity heading their way. The horrible witch lifts her fingers, framing Perchta’s tormented face inside of the box, between her index fingers and thumbs.

This should have been enough time by now. Fresh looks over her shoulder, towards the flooded city. He should be here any minute now. It’s about that time for herself then.

The witch slings her rucksack down, looking inside of it to see if everything’s still fine.

“Hey, I’m going to borrow this, okay?” she asks, walking up to a guardsman and yanking his crossbow from his hands. “Thanks!” Fresh hums to herself, kneeling down and drawing the bolt back, which is harder than she’d thought it would be. Good thing she did all those push-ups.

Fresh smiles, loading in the custom-made bolt. An arrow, tipped with a hollow moon-glass arrow-head, the shaft coated in a thin layer of crystal-drakonium.

[Purewater Arrow]{Holy}(Unique) A sturdy, masterwork arrow with a custom, fragile arrowhead that is filled with a unique blend of the rarest waters in the world, bathed in both sun and moonlight. When Inflicted: Removes all SOUL-based attributes, abilities, classes, perks and values when consumed. Resets HEALTH-POINTS to 0. Weight: 0.8kg Value: ???

Well, this has been fun and all. But that’s enough playing around. Jubilee will yell at her if she slacks off during their open hours. Fresh pulls the strap of the crossbow around her shoulders, sets her large, flat-brimmed hat onto her head and gets back onto her broom, kicking off into the air, flying towards Perchta.

The central-city was a lot of fun. But she hopes that the other place, the other continent where they’ll be living their next life, she hopes that it’s even more fun. She hopes that this next year to come will be just as rich and exciting and fulfilling as this one that has come to pass.

The witch lifts the crossbow, the broom shooting through the ruins of the city. A tentacle whips up towards her and she ducks down, pulling her head down. The broom spins and flies through an already shattered window, the shards just missing her by the skin of her teeth. With her legs clasping around the broomstick, Fresh clambers back upright, adjusting her course and leans against the shaft of the moving thing, as she holds the crossbow out in front of herself.

“Hey! Perchta!” yells the witch out ahead of herself.

The entity turns its face, screaming and lunging towards her as she draws closer once more, its massive maw open, a hundred tendrils rising up on both sides of herself, covering her in a shadow that is so heavy, that to an outside observer, it could seemingly only belong to the falling moon itself.

“I quit,” says Fresh, pulling the trigger.

Her arm kicks back, the bolt shoots from the crossbow, whistling with a sharp screech as it slices through the air.

The sky clears in an instant, the cloudy coverage that was there just a moment ago dissipates. Fresh can’t help but roll her eyes, of course. Basil might be right in saying that the gods are real, but Jubilee has a point in saying that they’re huge dicks if they are.

A radiant light shines from above, the impossibly strong glow of the sun piercing the veil, as the powers that be make themselves seen, make themselves known, just in the instant that the arrow shatters in Perchta’s mouth.

Perchta screams, lashing and flailing, her tendrils pressing into her own face as she tries to scrape out the poison. Fresh reaches back, tapping against the world-tree shielding ornament hanging from her bag. A small bubble of magical energies appears all around herself in that second, as she vanishes into darkness, having flown straight into the creature’s mouth.

“YOU!” yells a voice from all around herself, the first coherent words that she’s heard. “I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU!” Fresh stares at the face appearing before herself, a face that looks very much like her own. It reaches out towards her, grasping for her with sickly, wet, black hands that reach for her throat.

Flying in, still using her momentum, Fresh ducks through them and grabs the entity.

“Perchta…~” says Fresh, looking at the distraught creature that she’s holding in her arms, the twisted, gloopy, fetid thing that is the result of a soul festering and fermenting in the deepest reaches of misery and self-torment for a full decade. The entity, falling apart, stares at her with haunted, disgusted, furious eyes. Its hands try to swipe at her, to grab her, to choke her, to gouge her eyes out, but the black-water is receding, Perchta’s body is failing because of the purewater-arrow and her limbs are unable to grasp and her fingers unable to claw.

Fresh lifts a finger, smiling. “Boop!”

Her body suddenly lurches as she hurtles towards the ground, her broom unable to fly anymore. Fresh watches as the body of Perchta dissipates, coming apart into a a thousand droplets that splash all around herself, falling with herself as if she were just one of the many, just a splash of water, falling from the sky, just a thing that belongs to the place where she is.

Fresh lands in the water, splashing as it begins to recede, sinking back away beneath the ground and then, only a minute later, it’s all gone, as if it never was.

The witch lays there on the street, looking up towards the sky that is now as blue and as bright as on every other day, except for one thing. The witches’ moon is still there, the few clouds that remain are still stuck their of their own accord, until the wind might move them and so, now, there is an eclipse with the sun shining in full force, silhouetting the crooked, laughing face of the moon that smiles as if it knew her secret.

Fresh smiles too, lifting her finger towards her lips to shush it, before turning her head towards the sky, towards the gods who are watching, towards the entities that have made their appearance not to help the city and its people, but to take credit for her defeat of the evil.

That’s just politics, she supposes. It seems that the world below really does reflect the heavens above. It isn’t just cut-throat down here, it’s cut-throat up there too.

Fresh gets up, shaking out her wet sleeves and broom. She looks at the poor thing, but it doesn’t fly anymore. With Perchta gone, her patron as a witch, it’s out of magic. That means that her own powers are going to fade soon too. She needs to hurry, before…

“Ah.”

Fresh lifts her eyes, looking towards the man of the hour, the man who has finally arrived. The hero, Garnett.

She exhales a long breath, watching as the man silently marches towards her, watching as the people of the city, as the people of the castle stand above on the walls, on the towers, on the ramparts and watch.

The witch adjusts her hat, letting out a theatrical cackle, laughing smugly. There’s an image left to impart here, after all.

“I’ll tell your sister you said ‘hi’,” taunts the horrible, yet now just about powerless witch.

The man in the armor stands there, an unusually powerful wind coursing through the streets, billowing his tattered cape in a dramatic gale. It seems that everyone is prone to theatrics here. Without a word, the man lifts his sword into the air.

Fresh reaches down, grabbing her dagger and rushes towards him, knowing that she’s going to lose this fight. It’s nothing personal, at least not for herself. It’s just, you know; It is what it is.

The hero swings and the sword cuts through her shoulder, down through her heart.

Fresh dies.